Monolithic fiber/foam-structured catalysts: beyond honeycombs and micro-channels

Abstract

Heterogeneous catalysis plays a pivotal role in the current chemical and energy vectors production. Notably, to fully utilize the intrinsic activity and selectivity of a catalyst, the chemical reactor has to be designed and operated optimally to achieve enhanced heat/mass transfer, well-defined contact time of reactants, uniform flow pattern, and high permeability. Structured catalysts are a promising strategy to overcome the major drawbacks encountered in the traditional packed-bed reactor technology due to the improved hydrodynamics in combination with enhanced heat/mass transfer. Newly emerged fiber/foamsubstrates, with an entirely open 3D network structure, bring distinct advantages over the honeycomb and micro-channel contacting methods, including free radial diffusion, eddymixing driven heat/mass transfer, large area-to-volume ratio, and high contacting efficiency. However, how to place the nanocatalysts onto the fiber/foam-substrates is a challenging problem because the commercial washcoating method has great limitations such as the nonuniformity and easy exfoliation of coatings. This review discusses the newly developed non-dipcoating methods for the fiber/foam-structured catalysts and their promising applications in the strongly exo-/endo-thermic and/or high throughput reaction processes.

Monolithic Cu2O-CuO/Cu Mesh Catalyst for Ambient Ozone Removal

“…15−17 Generally, the active components should be loaded onto a carrier to form a monolithic catalyst. 18 For example, a monolithic catalyst with excellent hydrogen evolution performance was prepared by combining metal disulfide with a substrate via strong covalent bonds. 19 Besides, Cao 20 used an instant high-temperature interfacial plasma electrolytic oxidation method to synthesize a monolithic catalyst on a Mg substrate containing a Ru/MgO washcoat, which had a high hydrogen yield and exhibited excellent stability.…”

“…Generally, the active components should be loaded onto a carrier to form a monolithic catalyst . For example, a monolithic catalyst with excellent hydrogen evolution performance was prepared by combining metal disulfide with a substrate via strong covalent bonds .…”